Visit to the Thackray Medical Museum

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Saturday 23 October 2021 14:00

From £18.00

Listed by Spice Yorkshire

Overview

We will meet at 2pm at the main entrance and have a wander around the many exhibits before meeting up in the cafe for a coffee/tea and a cake at 3.30pm. Afterwards we will continue our visit of the museum which takes about 2 hours to look around. During our visit we will have a 15 minute talk from one of the Visitor Experience Team.

Your ticket will allow you to visit again any time for a whole year.

The museum is wheelchair accessible.

Immerse yourself in the imaginative and exciting galleries, from the history of healthcare to the advances that have shaped the way we look after ourselves, and each other.

Wander through the grimy streets of Victorian Leeds, watch gruesome operations taking place in their 19th-century operating theatre, visit a seventies-style sexual health clinic, chart how well the world responds to crisis, and discover the medical innovations that changed the world.

The Thackray family

The Thackray Museum of Medicine has its origins in a small family-run chemist shop, opened in 1902 by Charles Thackray, in Great George Street, Leeds. Charles developed the business into a major medical supply firm, supplying drugs and medical instruments and equipment around the world.

The business was finally sold to a multi-national company in 1990 and Charles’s grandson Paul, a company director, and major shareholder, established the museum to enable the wider public to learn more about the story of medicine.

The building

The museum building has a long and chequered history.

It first opened in 1861 as the purpose-built Leeds Union Workhouse, a harsh and unwelcoming home for poor and homeless people with nowhere else to go. Over the years, new buildings were gradually added to the workhouse complex, including a separate infirmary.

More enlightened policies and the introduction of state support in the early twentieth century meant that workhouses were no longer needed, and in 1925 the Leeds Union Workhouse Infirmary was renamed St James’s Hospital. By 1945, the rest of the workhouse had merged with the hospital and it became part of the NHS in 1948.

By the 1990s, the old Leeds Union Workhouse building was considered unfit for modern medicine. As a listed building, it could not be demolished and Parliament gave permission for it to house the Thackray Medical Museum, (now Thackray Museum of Medicine) which opened in 1997.

Includes

Entrance to the museum for a year, a short private talk and a coffee/tea and cake.

Extras

Additional food and drink.

Location & Itinerary

Food & Meals

We will have a break for a coffee/tea and a cake at 3.30pm.

Meeting Point

Main entrance at 2pm.

Getting There

The museum is located right next to St James's Hospital.. Coming from Leeds city centre it is on the left hand side after the hospital.

There is an onsite Pay and Display car park at the front of the museum. The machines accept coin and card payment .and it is £1 per hour.

Alternative parking can also be found at St James’s Hospital multi-storey car park which is a short walk away from the museum. it is located next to the landmark Leeds Cancer Centre building (Bexley Wing) and is clearly signposted as you enter the hospital site from Beckett Street.

There are also a small number of council-run cark parks along Beckett street opposite the museum but these tend to get busy.

You can get to the museum on the major bus routes from Leeds City Centre. Numbers: 16, 42, 49, 50 and 50A stop outside the museum.

Availability & Pricing

TypePrice
Member£18.00Sold Out
Guest£24.00Sold Out

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Beckett Street, Leeds, West Yorkshire, LS9 7LN

Host & Everything Else

Jill Pearson and Jonathan Banks on 07969 349714.

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